Oracle Error ORA-12560 TNS:Protocol Adapter error?

Question

I am using Oracle Database 10g. Both Servers are Windows 2003.

I have an Orcale Database set up on one server.

Here is the TNSNames.ora from the server with the database.

# tnsnames.ora Network Configuration File: C:\oracle\product\10.2.0\db_1\network\admin\tnsnames.ora
# Generated by Oracle configuration tools.

ORCL.VIRTUALHOLD.COM =
  (DESCRIPTION =
    (ADDRESS = (PROTOCOL = TCP)(HOST = databaseServer)(PORT = 1521))
    (CONNECT_DATA =
      (SERVER = DEDICATED)
      (SERVICE_NAME = orcl)
    )
  )

The Environmental Variables on the Server are

  ORACLE_HOME   =   C:\oracle\product\10.2.0\db_1
  ORACLE_SID    =   orcl

I am trying to connect to it from another box that has Oracle Client installed.

Here is the tnsnames.ora installed on the other client server.

# tnsnames.ora Network Configuration File: C:\oracle\product\10.2.0\client_1\network\admin\tnsnames.ora
# Generated by Oracle configuration tools.

ORCL =
  (DESCRIPTION =
    (ADDRESS_LIST =
      (ADDRESS = (PROTOCOL = TCP)(HOST = databaseServer)(PORT = 1521))
    )
    (CONNECT_DATA =
      (SERVICE_NAME = orcl)
    )
  )





 ORACLE_HOME    =   C:\oracle\product\10.2.0\client_1
 ORACLE_SID     =   orcl

Locally on the database server I can connect to through sqlplus with no issues.

On the client machine I keep getting the error:

 ORA-12560: TNS:protocol adapter error

What am I missing? Does the client TNSNames.ora need to be different?

Answer 1

Have you checked that the machines actually can find each other? That is, is "databaseServer" in a DNS or the machines hosts-file and that the lookup to it is correct.

Answer 2

check that there isn't a firewall between the 2 servers, and you can run tnsping from your client to see if it can see the server at all.